I am not sure that many people were aware, but The Moon was smacked, recently! It was this past March when our natural satellite was hit by a speeding meteroid. No signifcant damage was done, yet there was an explosion that created a flare which lasted long enough for scientists to study the scene.

Last Friday, N.A.S.A. went ahead and released a report about what happened. It was March 17 when observers with our national space program reported seeing an explosion on the lunar surface. A meteoroid which was reported to be less than one meter wide and weighing roughly forty kilograms struck The Moon at a racing rate of 56,000 miles per hour! Experts with N.A.S.A. stated that the impact shimmered with a glare equivalent to a 4th magnitude star!

Impacts from space debris and meteorites are common, as these objects are flying through space all of the time. Earth and The Moon indeed are pelted by these objects, regularly. It is that, while Earth can eliminate the vast majority of them by dissolving them by the strength of a powerful atmosphere, The Moon has no such protective cover to keep objects from striking it’s surface. It is due to this fact that any objects hurtling through space and reaching The Moon will impact it, and will leave a resulting scar.

The impact of the meteroid indeed created an explosion, despite the lack of oxygen necessary to produce fire! Scientists with N.A.S.A. reported that a flash of light from the impact came from the glow of the molten rock at the instant of the impact. At that very moment, there was the energy and the heat needed to produce the moment of fire, though surely it did not last long!